War-Everything Earth-Addendum 8, vol. 35

War – Everything Earth (“EE”) Addendum 8, vol. 35
Dr. Aazort’s Advanced Earth Studies Group – Multiversity of Artaxia

Greetings to Artaxia from exotic Earth! Your esteemed professor continues to masquerade as a human on this wonderful planet where “human” is so loosely defined that quite a wide variety of creatures are passing. Of course, understanding “human” remains my reason for having regularly visited here for several thousand years compiling your handy, dandy “Everything Earth” reference. Remember, these are potential space-faring beings. You don’t want one showing up at your door without ready access to your EE. Order yours today! (NOTE: Owing to the Federated System’s “no official contact” embargo of Earth, “Everything Earth” cannot be shipped to Earth.)

I have a number of EE “basics” entries that need review, starting with “organized theft,” called “war” by humans. War is so essential to the human experience that on Earth “war” and “history” are nearly synonymous. War can occur among large groups like nation states, or mere street gangs. In the former case, it is sanctioned by the state and therefore legal. With street gangs, the same behavior is considered a crime. The only real difference I can find is in the levels of organization and violence.

The basic process consists in collecting a group, forming some talking points, arming yourselves and doing violence to anyone whose possessions you covet. “Booty” alone was a good enough cause for Earth’s ancients, but in modern times, many highfalutin motives are offered, invariably including some twist on self-defense even in cases of naked aggression.

In past ages coveted possessions usually consisted in portable wealth like food, domesticated animals and especially the heavy element gold — things that could be carried off the enemy’s land as “spoils of war.” (“spoils”!) Soon, the land itself became the coveted item. By possessing armed political control over the land, the people living there could be taxed (robbed by decree), colonized and otherwise extorted on a continuing basis as part of one’s “empire.” This remained the case until just recently, when weapons like thermonuclear explosives became so efficient that their use by anyone could cause a mass extinction.

One might think that, at this point, the war habit would have been sensibly dropped. But humans are so deeply fascinated by war that they merely dialed back their conflicts and tried to stick with “conventional” weapons, essentially just hoping no one would use the advanced devices. This hope has accompanied most radical advances in weaponry and failed every time, so the outcome is “iffy.”

But it’s the fascination itself that fascinates. Humanity’s regard for “war” is incredibly ambivalent. It is both universally condemned and universally practiced. Covetousness, theft and especially killing are forbidden by nearly all religious belief (See EE, “Peculiar Supernatural Enterprises.”); yet religious belief and related ideologies are often driving forces to war. One of Earth’s most successful generals described war as “hell,” while zealously killing, raping, burning and looting his way through great swaths of his own country!

The strangest aspect of war to an Artaxian is this sheer persistence. Earth’s two biggest wars, called World Wars and actually numbered “One” and “Two,” occurred within the memory of a single generation. No individual human would make such a disastrous mistake twice in a lifetime. But, acting in their tribes, “groupthink” turns otherwise intelligent primates into murderous thugs.

Dr. Aazort concludes that human art, starting with literature, lies at the root of this behavior. Humans embodied their fascination with war in the earliest entertainments following civilization, usually long poems where the protagonists loomed as “heroes.” To this day, the young are fed on warrior myths, growing up with an adult-sanctioned perversion of literally all their highest professed values, including love, nobility, courage, self-sacrifice, etc. Given a war to attend, most young men will eagerly drop whatever productive work they might be doing and dash out to participate.

And, until very recently, this syndrome only affected males. “Heroes” of war stories were held up as role models for all males. As females achieved higher status in some societies on Earth, they, too, participated in this ancient rite that promises self-realization through self-destruction.

Strange in countless ways, humans are truly baffling here. Persistence in this behavior must result in either self-extinction or continued enforcement of the Embargo, with only furtive and illegal contacts with other intelligent species. For any truly space-faring race, I’m not sure which is worse.

Dr. Aazort’s Film and Video:

As my mentor, Prof. Spode Hardratt said: “If you want to study humans, you gotta watch TV.” Since so much human TV is so very bad, I’ve limited myself primarily to movies and their other long forms.

Good: An Ideal Husband (UK) 1999 PG-13 http://www.answers.com/topic/an-ideal-husband-film-2 Here’s a nice, old-fashioned romantic comedy with roots deep in Oscar Wilde. It’s set at the turn of the 19th century, dealing with themes (if you look kinda hard) about right activity and moral compass. Cate Blanchett sans ten years is wonderful as the naive wife. Julianne Moore is lovably evil, and Lord Arthur Goring (Rupert Everett) stands in as a hetero Oscar W., London’s most eligible and dissolute bachelor. It offers a straightforward plot, that still manages some twists and turns. Just enjoyable — and this is more than I can say for too many much newer films.

Really Good: Sin City 2005 R http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0401792/ I loved this “pulp noir” “American Manga” thing from comic book artist Frank Miller, directed by Richard Rodriguez and Miller, with some guest directing by Quentin Tarantino. This is a black and white, high contrast urban nightscape splashed with appropriate colors as the levels of gore demand. There are a variety of great actors: Bruce Willis, Mickey Rourke, Clive Owen, Elijah Wood spinning out three entwined stories that cycle back on each other in the fun Tarantino style we aliens have grown to love. It’s all tarted up with great special FX and computer work and makes sense in its own world (happily enough, not mine). The movie is way heavy with style, but apparently faithful to Mr. Miller’s original vision. I had never heard of him. The new (“unrated”) standard, Blu-Ray and HD versions are now out. Check out the site at http://video.movies.go.com/sincity/ and, if (like me) you don’t often buy DVDs, look for the least-cut version you can watch on cable, Netflix, etc.